


cupid is a knavish lad

by hissingmiseries



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, M/M, One Shot, Soulmate-Identifying Timers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-24
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-09-11 19:42:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9008443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hissingmiseries/pseuds/hissingmiseries
Summary: And she’s his soulmate, he decides - it’s her death date on his wrist. Of course it is. Who else’s could it be?
 Or, another soulmate AU that nobody asked for.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [imaginentertain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/imaginentertain/gifts).



Robert Sugden is - experimental, let's say.

He is blonde hair and bitten lips and a horrible, diseased heart. He is the fiancé of the boss' daughter and the occasional lover of the boss' other daughter and, when he's had enough to drink, he keeps the barman's bed warm.

He is happy with Chrissie. He loves her. He loves when she kisses him, when he burrows himself into the base of her neck, smells her perfume. He loves the weight of her on top of him, loves the feel of her hand on his back. Loves when she introduces him to her clients. _My fiancé, Robert_.

Sure, his eye wanders a little. Everyone's does. They're lying if they say it doesn't.

 

His timer is still ticking away - this rhythmic, soft buzzing on his wrist. Tick tick tick. _03:11:28:19:_ \- more numbers: slowly filtering away, diminishing second by second. It doesn't matter that much.

He can do this, he thinks. They will get married and live happily ever after; Robert with his beautiful wife, with a successful business and enough money in his pocket to not just survive but live. It used to be kind of suffocating but - it isn't, anymore.

If only Jack Sugden could see him now.

 

-

 

I mean - _Emmerdale_ , of all places. You couldn't write it.

He is a famous face here; a legend, arguably, but not a favoured one. Everyone's faces have aged and weathered but they still remember him, little Robert Sugden, the prodigal son. Or, more accurately, Jack Sugden's little boy who left nothing but a trail of heartbreak behind him - smoke, crashed cars, Max King, all because he never listened to anybody. Rude, arrogant Robert Sugden, who needed to be taught a lesson but left before anybody had a chance.

"Chrissie, _please_ ," he says, voice bordering on the right side of pleading. "Do we have to live here?"

It's a question that already has its answer. Chrissie wants the big house on the hill.

What Chrissie wants, she gets.

 

Things go a lot smoother than he expects, though, and that's always a relief. He walks into the pub and Diane and Vic are there, happy to see him. Vic has grown so much, grown into something loving and beautiful; she hugs him twice and he kisses her hair. He's missed her more than he realised.

Andy is - well, Andy. His fist meets Robert's face within seconds. Katie is still here, looking suitably disgruntled, and Nicola's face is just as sour as ever.

Nothing seems to have changed: everything is still very Emmerdale and that grinds him down a little. He'd hoped things had at least moved on.

 

"I hate this," he mumbles into Chrissie's shoulder. They're in bed, it's dark outside. Her eyes are dull with fatigue. "Why here?"

She makes a low, sympathetic sound and kisses the top of his head. "Oh, I know. But just think about it: we're in a gorgeous house and you're back with your family. You'll have chance to, y'know, patch things up with them."

She says it like it's some beautiful, rom-com thing. It really, really isn't.

"Right," he begins. "So if me and Andy become best mates, we'll move out?"

She just kind of chuckles at him, and rolls over to turn the light off.

 

There's this weird sensation on his wrist: heat, sharp and persistent. The same feeling of when Chrissie or Bex drag their nails down his back, down his arms. It stings.

Robert learnt to ignore things very early on - he's found that ignoring things, burying things tends to get rid of them for a while. Or at least until he's found a way to fix it properly.

How he fixes his timer going down to fucking _00:00:00:32:56:10_ , he has no clue.

 

-

 

"Vic," he says at the bar. Usually she'd carry on serving but there must be something in his voice because she stops, approaches him. "I need to talk to you."

She dusts her hands down and nods. "What's up?"

He swallows; his wrist feels - odd. "Not here."

 

They're in the kitchen. It smells like beef stew and washing up liquid. "Go on then," Vic prompts. "What's up with ya?"

Robert feels his skin prickle as he draws his sleeve up, moving his watch out of the way. His timer glows a little, twelve silver numbers fluttering innocently: _00:00:00:12:27:09_. It's brighter than yesterday, more urgent. It feels like something's coming.

Vic blinks before her eyes go very wide. "Oh my - _Robert_."

 

Robert is never usually speechless but this is - this is something else.

He has loved before; he loves now. He'd fall in love and his timer would shrink, shrink and shrink to almost nothing and he'd think maybe, just maybe he's done it. In this tiny, shitty little village, he's found the person he's meant to spend the rest of his life with. Then it would leap and the numbers would fly up and it'd be another relationship; another love where it's just settled, has that weight of giving up. A _you'll_ _do_ kind of love.

He assumes it will happen again this time. Emmerdale has given him many things in life but happiness has never been one of them.

 

-

 

Chrissie is not a _you'll_ _do_. She is perfect. She is lustrous and funny and just the right amount of cynical; she is sharp enough to cut himself on and that excites him. He has always loved danger.

He doesn't deserve her. He gets told that a lot, and he agrees each time.

 

When he met her, he instinctively looked towards his timer. He always does, every time he sees something he wants: he looks for back-up, looks for justification. The numbers were just kind of languid, dragging a little and his heart leapt because every change means something. That's what they'd told him at school.

It didn't change. It just kept going, sure and steady. _07:05:63:02:14 -_

Hers didn't change either. Neither of them cared. They wanted each other.

That means more than a few numbers, right?

 

-

 

Some little fucker steals his car. Two little fuckers, in fact, with dark hair and dark eyes and dark clothes. They whisper to each other and it's a good job Robert is tech-savvy otherwise his precious Audi would be in a different country by now.

"Never rely on the manufacturer's tracker," he announces. The door opens with a snap and -

Something changes.

They play ignorance but not for long; the grumpy-looking one concedes first. There's something stirring in him, behind his eyes. He looks - dangerous.

Robert likes dangerous.

 

When he gets out, he sucks in the air with a newfound need for oxygen; Emmerdale has always tasted like car smoke and grease and freshly-cut grass but now it doesn't burn his throat like it used to. The village hasn't changed a bit but things still look different - the trees are greener, the roofs are cleaner, the sky is a new shade of blue. Something has changed and Robert's fucking confused.

Everything is telling him: _wrist_. He wrenches up his sleeve and looks.

_70:06:41:25:23:51:01._

The letters are smokey and red, like heated metal. They tick with a new ferocity. He has read about this before: white numbers mean good, mean something beautiful and euphoric on the horizon, mean meeting the other half of your soul. Red numbers mean bad - mean death, mean counting down to the end.

Robert never thought he'd see red numbers in his lifetime. But here he is, with seventy years on the clock. Somebody else's seventy years.

He turns around. The garage stares back at him, harsh, pointed.

 

_That's alright then, negotiate with me._

This is it, isn't it? Emmerdale being - Emmerdale. Unpredictable, vengeful. Out for him.

He'd hoped for closure but- not like this.

 

-

 

He ignores it at first. He is very good at ignoring things.

He is not very good, however, at leaving things alone. Which sounds oxymoronic, but it isn't, not really; he can want things and take things and ignore what it causes. Call it a survival tactic, if you will.

And this guy, this Aaron - Chas' son, unbelievably - is difficult to leave alone. Aaron is something new, something Robert hasn't tried before; he is rough around the edges, full of anger and constantly guarded and whilst Robert couldn't really give two fucks about breaking his way through to his heart, his bed is something else entirely.

He says some nasty things to Aaron every now and again. Aaron casts him a look, a sideways glare of offence, but always comes back in the end: back to the garage, back to the barn, back to wherever they can find. They are hot and fast together and - it just kind of mutates. Robert doesn't know where it comes from, this weird thing in his chest but it develops. Every time he sees Aaron it spikes a little, pressing out against his ribs.

His timer is still red. It is slowly ticking down, and Robert feels sick when he looks at it.

So he doesn't.

Chrissie buys him a new watch. It's a Rolex, it's worth half of their entire house. He'd superglue it to his skin if he could.

 

He loves Chrissie a lot; he reminds himself of it when she cooks him breakfast or kisses him and leaves lipstick on his cheek. She's a bloody good lay, as well, so she really does tick every box.

And she's his soulmate, he decides - it's her death date on his wrist. Of course it is. Who else's could it be?

(Robert is very good at ignoring things.)

 

"You know," Chrissie says, sleepy-eyed. "You hide your timer a lot."

He shifts a little. "It's just the same as always." End of.

 

He fucks Aaron in a hotel, a crappy one with greying sheets and cheap coffee. He likes this; likes it more than he really should. It's not the sneaking about aspect that sets him on fire - he has practised that for longer than he'd like to admit - but the way Aaron looks in this light. The way he looks spread out over the duvet, aching and bitten pink. Receptive.

They're lying there, post-coital tired when there's a flash of red.

Robert has to ask. He - he just has to. "Do you have a timer?"

Immediately he kind of regrets it. He'd told himself a long time ago that this was going to be a casual thing and by the look on Aaron's face, he's touched upon something sensitive. "Everyone does," is Aaron's half-grunted reply, and it feels rehearsed.

"Mine's got ages left on it," Robert says. He flashes it; it's extremely bright today, like it's burning, branding his skin. "It's red, though. Feels weird."

Aaron is hiding his arm beneath the pillow, the same way Robert does when he's in bed with Chrissie. "Good for you."

"How long's left on yours?"

"Dunno," Aaron says. "Don't care. Probably never gonna meet them, anyway."

 

The next morning, when they have regained their energy, Aaron lets Robert push him down. Straddle his hips and mess up his washed hair. His pupils are blown out and he looks fucking hot, hot and dark and hungry, open with want.

Robert feels alive, incandescent. Aaron is underneath him, looking up at him with these eyes, full of something - something he can't quite decode but he's seen it before.

They've spilt coffee on the sheets. They're still wet. Robert can feel it beneath his stomach.

Aaron can feel it too, and tries to move but Robert doesn't let him; he pushes him down into the sheets and takes his wrists, pins them above his head. Something crimson and glowing blinks up at him.

 

Robert doesn't quite know what he's getting himself into but - this is weird. This is a feeling in his arms, in his head, somewhere in the pit of his gut. It's a feeling that pulsates out of him with such force it unbalances him sometimes. Not like with Chrissie; she is calm, she is consistent, dare he say monotonous. She makes him what he is supposed to be.

Not Aaron. Aaron makes him what he is.

 

-

 

_Because I love ya._

Robert has never felt anything like this. Like - something breaking out of him, leaking into his bloodstream. It feels good for a split-second and then it doesn't.

 

He marries Chrissie, just like he promised he would. Lawrence writes him into the will, just like he promised he would.

Katie has to die for it, but it goes ahead. Nobody suspects a thing.

He did love Katie, once. He honestly did. He loved her with every beat of his heart, loved her from the curve of her smile to the tips of her long blonde hair. She was beautiful and funny and she loved him back; she tasted like sugar and fucking triumph. They'd gotten engaged and things were going just swimmingly until - well, until Robert fucked it all up. No surprise there.

He used to ache with how much he loved her. She always looked gorgeous, even after just waking up, and the sounds she'd make were like angels and, yeah, Robert loved her.

Best of all, he loved her because she used to be Andy's, and then she wasn't, she was his. That was - was indescribable.

Robert spent a good portion of his life walking around with a lust for anything of Andy's. His food, his women. He'd claw it and tear it from him and not care if he drew blood; in fact, he'd _hope_ to draw blood. If he couldn't have the way Jack looked at Andy, then he'd have everything else, and he'd hurt him whilst doing it.

(He also puts it down to that moment when he thought his clock stopped the first time he met Andy. It - fucking scared him, to be honest.)

 

But yes, Katie is dead.

If life had been in Robert Sugden's favour, this wouldn't be fucking happening. If it had one inkling of like for him, his timer would have stopped now.

But it doesn't. Andy's does, though. He doesn't notice, however - it's hidden by his jacket sleeve.

Aaron is horrified, of course; he is runny-nosed and his eyes are glassy with tears, and Robert shamelessly drags him into this because who else can he tell? He's never felt lower and more vulnerable than now, spitting his excuses like loose teeth but Aaron goes along with it. He's in far too deep.

Robert looks down at Katie. He'd like to say she could be sleeping but her eyes are fixed open and the slant of her neck, the way it aligns, is off; she can't be alive like that.

 

Andy's timer is all noughts. It's black and empty and hollow.

He tries to drive himself off of a cliff; typical Andy, taking everything too far. Robert doesn't let him do it, though. He insults him and spits Jack back in his face and does what he does best but it works.

Fireworks go off, big and powerful in the sky. His timer feels - hot. Really hot, hot enough to burn through him, clean through to the other side. He looks down at it and -

The numbers are falling. Fast. Too fast to be natural.

And Aaron's missing.

 

Aaron's fine. He's - he's alive.

Robert's timer winds itself back up the seventy years the next day.

Call it a wake-up call, if you will.

 

-

 

It happens a few times, that does: that sudden decline, his red numbers falling so sharply from seventy years down to mere minutes, seconds even.

 

Aaron is pale and sweaty. He's curled into himself in the Portacabin and despite all of the heaters working at full blast, he is shivering in his seat like a baby bird. There's something wrong - there is definitely something wrong and even though Robert hasn't exchanged two words with Aaron for a long time, he knows when something is bothering him. It's instinctive, it's kind of - it's a soulmate thing, really.

But Robert is not very good at figuring Aaron out, not yet. If it isn't Robert himself causing harm then he doesn't know what else it could be. Everything seems fine for Aaron now: reunited parents, booming business. Everything looks good.

But something is very wrong. Aaron's left a note on his desk, he can't get out of there quick enough.

And of course Robert reads it. He needs to know what he's dealing with, doesn't he?

 

His blood runs cold. It turns to ice when Aaron passes out against the car. He collapses into Robert's arms and Robert's panicking, everything about him is frantic with worry and his timer is throbbing with pain against his skin, falling, crashing almost -

Robert is very good at ignoring things, but not Aaron. Never Aaron.

 

He loves him, completely, embarrassingly, unyieldingly. It's depressing that it took being shot for him to realise that but sometimes it takes that to put things into perspective; his brother despises him, Ross despises his brother too, and Aaron did time inside for it - and there was no fucking way Robert was going to let Aaron rot in a cell. Whether he'd done it or not.

And Robert loves him. As simple and complicated as that.

He remembers the way he'd used to say _I love you_ to Chrissie; the way it'd get him out of trouble, a lot of the time. Oldest trick in the book. He turned it from a proclamation to a bargaining chip and he's - not proud of that.

But it's different with Aaron.

 

Aaron tells him something - awful. If Robert could _set Gordon on fire_ , he would. And he tells him something back, something he's had building up for a long time.

And Aaron doesn't believe him.

He supposes he deserves it, really.

 

-

 

Robert proposes and Aaron responds by crashing their car into a lake. There's probably a message in there, somewhere.

When they set off, driving Lachlan around the countryside, his timer is relaxed: _69:09:43:18:20:33:01_. Ages left.

But then they crash, and Robert is woken by the feeling of his numbers changing again; they are smouldering, bright orange in the darkness, and when his eyes adjust through the water he reads them, reads their urgency. _00:00:00:00:00:20:19_.

Aaron uses his last breath to tell Robert - of all people - that he loves him. He reaches forward, points dramatically at Robert's timer and begs him to please, just go. Maybe before, a couple of years ago, he would have. He'd have clawed his way out and gone back home to Chrissie and held himself as he went to sleep, swallowed down the guilt with everything else.

But not now. That isn't an option now.

He manages to free him. The steering column is firm and strong but he manages it; he would have stayed even if he hadn't. He even goes back to rescue Lachlan, and if that isn't a sign that he's changed then he doesn't know what is.

Lachlan isn't there, though; he's stood at the side, blood pouring from his head, watching the whole thing. Robert feels his blood boil. He wants to close his hands around that freak and hold him under, wants to tear him apart with his fists and his teeth and - he would, but he's got bigger things to worry about.

 

-

 

They were in Aaron's bed - their bed - and Aaron said, "My timer stopped when ya got shot."

Robert paused; he ran his fingers idly along the curve of Aaron's torso, along the raised lines of scar tissue. "Seriously?"

"Yeah," Aaron nodded. "It - went black and went down to all zeros. Then kind of started back up again."

"That must have freaked you out," Robert said, settling his hand in the crook of Aaron's arm.

Aaron was very quiet. He nodded slightly, softly, then leaned in: what he does when he wants to be kissed. Robert indulged him, like he always does. Like he always will, for as long as Aaron wants him to.

 

-

 

Robert's timer goes black on the twenty-first of October, 2016. It darkens like ash, dissipates slightly at the edges.

"It's not starting up again," he says to Chas. They're sat in the waiting room, all of them shaking. "Why isn't it starting up? What's taking them so long?"

"Give 'em time, Rob," she replies, voice uneven. "They'll fix him."

 

His wrist feels dead; he can't even feel his own pulse in there anymore. He used to hate the way the numbers burned, the way they screamed and dug their nails in every time he went near Aaron. Now they're gone, though, he misses them. They meant everything - meant everything was okay, that slow, rhythmic decline meant that there was still time left. It was stable. Robert likes stability; he needs it to survive. He needs things to go his way.

 

He stares at the line of circles until they're stuck on his retinas. They're black like a hearse, like a funeral suit and oblivion and -

"Robert," Chas says. She sounds distant. "Robert - _look_."

He feels it change before he sees it.

Red, bright and vengeful. Like blood, like smouldering iron. Like a sunset over the hills.


End file.
